


Dead End Kings

by rinkirunkku



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anonymous Sex, Character Study, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, Lovers to Friends, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Unrequited Love, gladio isn't keen on catching them Feels(tm) but some things are inevitable
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-08
Updated: 2018-01-08
Packaged: 2019-03-01 22:45:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13304925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rinkirunkku/pseuds/rinkirunkku
Summary: "So maybe he’d been ten when he decided loving another wasn’t for him, and maybe he’d lived by this promise for thirteen long years. But sometimes things decided in haste weren’t principles worth clinging to, but instead relics from a broken past yet to be overcome."25 drabbles of a young man learning how to love.





	Dead End Kings

**Author's Note:**

> hej! heads up for an angst fest!
> 
> title by katatonia's 2012 album, for katatonia is music fit for these fools; dark and broody and melancholic with a hint of romanticism in there somewhere.
> 
> [@agi92](http://agi92.tumblr.com/) provided us all with [fanart](http://agi92.tumblr.com/post/169480277762/) for this obscure ship, so make sure to check it out !!

_i._

It started off like things usually did with him: physical, bold, hands rough, skin on skin. Teeth, pressure. Wanton need. Lust.

Things started to falter when the guy opened his mouth. He didn’t like it when they did that.

“Aren’t you a pretty thing,” the man drawled, voice barely there. “Gorgeous.”

It wasn’t that the drunkards usually said when filling his mouth. They turned vulgar, cursed and panted, never looked him in the eye, but this guy?

“Don’t hurt yourself. We’re not in a hurry.”

The sincere look, a thoughtful hand, considerate curve on the lips made him ill. He wasn’t there to be taken care of, he was there to forget the inevitability of the world.

“Shut up and let me do my job,” he snarled in answer.

The guy had the audacity to smile at him when spilling down his throat. To still keep smiling when he reached down and kissed him straight on the mouth.

“Your turn?”

Usually he ran afterwards.

But now? He wasn’t sure what possessed him.

“Sure.”

 

 

_ii._

It was a coping mechanism of sorts.

Physical exercises could only do so much for the seething hatred he felt for the world, so once storming through practicing dummies no longer brought him ease, he turned to hard liquor and men. Disappearing into the dark nights of Insomnia had proved a good alternative to feeling sorry for oneself at home, so he kept at it whenever the world became too much.

His father had seen it once already. The apple didn’t drop far from a tree, as it were.

“Don’t go fathering any bastard children,” he said to Gladio one morning. Little did he know there wouldn’t be problems with that particular subject.

Iris didn’t understand why the scowl on her brother’s brow never ceased to exist, but she was only thirteen. Her years of throwing herself into simple hedonistic pleasures to run away from problems had yet to meet her.

Gladio was afraid for her for when they did.

 

 

_iii._

The weekend after he skipped. The weekend after that, he was there at 11 o’clock sharp, trying to look inconspicuous in the baseball cap of his, but was still recognized. Greeted with a fake name, the guy from two weeks ago sat down next to him, ordered him a drink, then two, three, all four of them on his own tab.

“You’re being awfully generous,” Gladio muttered over the rim of his fifth pint. It was good beer, _expensive_ beer, though the guy with a ponytail didn’t seem to mind buying it, shrugging him off.

“I was hoping I’d get a replay tonight,” he mused, intoxication high on his cheekbones. The guy’s teeth were sharp, predatory and unnerving, but the smile he wore flattened any fear Gladio might’ve -- _or might’ve not_ \-- had brewing inside of him.

“Sure.”

They made out in the toilets, and never once did the guy’s grip on Gladio’s hip roughen when he jacked them both off.

Gladio still tasted his mouth in his the next morning and found himself not hating it.

 

 

_iv._

His first was a boy two years his senior, bushy eyebrows and a split lip, an awkward tattoo on his shoulder. Gladio only knew his last name, remembered hearing it in the midsts of a conversation when in dressing rooms, never knew how it was written, but didn’t find himself yearning to know. A first nameless face of many.

The boy was tender, inexperienced and only knew of lips of a different gender, so only after jesting and provoking did he bite down and mean it. He came too fast, was made fun of, and fit his fist through Gladio’s nose for revenge. Gladio let him.

He found it funny how the boy clung to his girlfriends every time they met afterwards. It was even funnier when he came back by himself, without provoking bit down on Gladio’s tender flesh, wormed his way beneath his skin, and then again left him spent and used against the bathroom stalls without returning the favor.

The funniest of all was his face when after the third time Gladio got fed up and bit back, broke his nose and left him bloodied behind the bleachers, for he was not one to be used like this, for he was the one setting the rules.

Not once did the boy contact him from there on.

 

 

_v._

He wanted no strings attached, yet some strings still attached themselves.

He once walked into Ignis’ apartment to find an old man sitting on his couches. The name he couldn’t recall, but he remembered vividly how the granpa hadn't looked at him eye to eye, not once had he address him straight, but had made leeway requests as if he hadn't existed. How he’d breathed out a different name when Gladio had thrown a blanket over his shoulders and left his apartment. How he’d left Gladio money on the table that Gladio had no interest in.

The man seemed to recall the same, as he stood up immediately and left before Ignis managed a word out his mouth.

“Pardon my uncle,” he scoffed and handed him a cup. “He’s lost his edge on hospitality along with his youthfulness, I’m afraid.”

 

 

_vi._

Gladio met others like Ignis' uncle when the years rolled by; a clerk in a nearby bookstore, a person in line for the movies, Iris’ friend’s older brother. Others ignored him, didn’t remember him or played ignorant, whereas some greeted him with the deceit name he’d once them given.

“Who’s ‘Globulus’?” his father asked him once, but only once, for it was not his place to ask questions, for he was the distant father figure that wasn't supposed to care.

“My nick on  _King’s Knight_ ,” Gladio lied once they’d left the flower store. “Don’t worry about it.”

 

 

_vii._

Things came to an abrupt pause when his father one day walked him to the Kingsglaive headquarters. The man was sitting in the boss guy’s room, hair no longer in a ponytail, clothes proper and fixed and littered with war trophies. Gladio recognized panic in his eyes, but only because he felt the same lurch on the bottom of his own stomach.

“Ulric,” Drautos said. “Meet the Shield of the King, Clarus Amicitia, and his son, Gladiolus.”

And for a second, just a second, Ulric’s face turned into a sharp smile of a man who had the world at his fingertips.

“Oh, I think we’ve met.”

 

 

 

_viii._

In the end, Ulric didn’t spill the beans. Gladio expected him to; anyone else would’ve. What better way to gain a few ranks than to out the son of the Shield of the King, to come out with all the dirty little deeds the boy was up to at nights he wasn’t home?

Ulric could’ve, but Ulric didn’t. It became a mantra that the man seemed to live by.

Gladio knew he should’ve been grateful -- if not for his own sake, then for his father’s --, but never quite found himself caring. The guy found this both infuriating and impossibly funny.

“I mean,” Nyx started one day, sitting down next to him in the cafeteria, “I’m the good do-gooder here, you should be praying for forgiveness and whatnot. I mean, _shit,_  what it if it’d been Sonitus? Man, you’d be in so much shit right now.”

For a guy of such a sweet temper, Ulric spewed hexes like a man about to die. It suited him, brought charm to his whole ordeal, but it was weird, considering how gentle he was… otherwise.

But then again, Gladio didn’t know him _that_ well.

“Don’t really give a shit.”

“But you should, shouldn’t you?” he pondered, a hand on his chin and eyes tight on Gladio’s. “This could come and bite you in the ass later.”

“What ‘this’?”

And before the guy disappeared into the masses of identical uniforms, he slipped a piece of paper beneath Gladio’s tray.

The whole thing would’ve been endearing, were it not for the scribbled little heart in the corner of the paper and the ‘’ _\- xoxo call me"_ that was clearly put there just to spite him. Though he crumpled the paper now, he smoothed it out later that night to add the number to his contacts, for one could never have too many numbers for booty calls.

 

 

 

_ix._

They met a few times in a span of the first two months. Gladio found it easier to just text Nyx than to go out and search for some new, faceless and nameless fuck, and despite his quirks, Nyx was good company.

Sometimes their trainings overlapped on Wednesdays, so they ended their routines by sparring together. Only a few Glaives favoured the greatsword, so Gladio was a new challenge to Nyx, who had already burned through most his colleagues, and Gladio found his sharp reflexes and sharper wit more captivating than the lifeless training dolls.

Though they started off as strangers, Gladio found himself now willing to call Nyx a friend. They still exchanged spit and handjobs in the dark -- though more often than not it was in the dressing rooms instead of a back alley of some seedy bar --, but now the act was accompanied with a banter Gladio had never dared to unleash before.

They joked around, fucked around, wrestled and bloodied their knuckles while still wearing smiles. Nyx laughed at him, _with_ him, told him what felt good and asked what he liked, kissed his neck and pecs and lips and abs, littered him with endearments just to brush them off later.

They were friends, with benefits, and it worked well like that; no hard feelings, no strings attached. Gladio basked in the attention like a cat in sunlight, and it felt good to fall in step with a person who took him as he was, unaltered and unquestionably him, while not asking too much of him in return.

 

 

_x._

Nyx had always called him names. Not bad names, per se, but names nevertheless. _Love_ , _dear_ , _darling_. Names he wasn’t ready for, names never meant for the likes of him.

On good days, they made him feel wanted. On bad ones, he wanted to throw up.

“What’s with the pet names?” he asked, spent against the mattress. Did he look like ‘ _a small one_ ’ to him?

But Nyx just laughed, furrowing his body closer to Gladio’s side. If Gladio didn’t hear the meaning behind them… He wasn’t ready to hear it in words, either.

Gladio just called him _fucker_ , sometimes _bastard_ . Rarely by his first name, never by his rank. These names had no heat or weight behind them; he could’ve used them of anyone he considered a friend. Once, smothered by an afterglow and the post-orgasm haste, he slipped up and called him _babe_. Months later, Nyx still teased him about it.

 

 

_xi._

“I mean… The bastard?” Gladio spat. “The bastard is just --”

“Yeah…”

“And then? Then he --”

“Yup…”

“But worst of all --”

“M-mm…”

“You’re not listening, are you.”

Nodding along, Nyx spun his glass against the counter. “Yeah…”

Sure, he was looking _straight_ at Gladio, his eyes following every bit of movement going on on his face, but his mind didn’t seem to be in it. He’d had this vacant and faraway look in his eyes the whole night, though until now he’d been at least participating in the conversation. It wasn’t like him, and Gladio didn’t feel comfortable blaming the behaviour on their drinks, either.

It took Gladio to stop talking for Nyx to perk up a little, eyes alert.

“Sorry, can I have that last bit again?”

“No.” Gunning down the rest of his drink, Gladio waved the bartender to them. “You’re distracted.”

Nyx scrunched up his nose. ”Untrue. You’ve got my undivided attention.”

”Yeah, right.”

Once the bartender left their table with two new glasses of beer, Gladio hogged both of them. Their eyes met over the seized alcohol, Nyx’s questioning and Gladio’s expectant, before Nyx relented with a sigh and let his head fall onto the table before them.

”What’s bugging you?” Gladio asked, not quite worried. ”This isn’t like you.”

”I’m just… Not feeling it tonight,” Nyx said, waving a hand around them in a dismissing manner. ”I mean, this?” — the hand came between them, still waving viciously — ”This is cool. But the this?” — and then continued to gesture around the bar — ”Not really.”

”You articulate like an 8-year-old.” Gladio broke into a smile when his comment earned him a shove.

”Fuck off,” Nyx laughed and stole his glass from beneath Gladio’s hand. ”What I’m saying is that we’ve been visiting the same shithole for months now and I wouldn’t mind the change of scenery every now and then. You know?”

”Aww…” A chuckle made its way up Gladio’s throat before he could really swallow it down. Nothing malicious, just a little unexpected. ”You want me to take you on a date?”

”No!” Nyx hissed, but he knew he’d hit the right chord when Nyx’s face was planted back against the counter. ”Okay, maybe? I just miss going out, is all.”

”I can take you out, alright. You into live music?”

For a second there, Nyx didn't move, but once he raised his head, there was doubt on his face. ”You’re not pulling my leg right now, are you?”

”No. Why would I?”

”Didn’t take you as one for the dating scene.”

”Okay,” Gladio squinted and laid both his hands on the table. ”There’s a distinction to be made between ’one date’ and ’dating’, I think. And this is the former.”

”Okay,” Nyx squinted back at him and mocked Gladio by positioning his hands like Gladio's were. ”But I thought you did neither.”

With fascination, Nyx followed as something unreadable passed on Gladio’s features, but it was gone an instant later. ”I don’t.”

Amused, he nudged Gladio’s foot. ”Sounds fake, but alright.”

”I don’t! I just want company for a gig!”

”Sure, sure, keep telling yourself that.”

 

 

_xii._

The next weekend, Gladio took him to see a band he’d never heard of, introduced him to a concept of mosh pits, challenged him to a drinking competition, won him in a drinking competition. He’d never thought someone could drink him beneath a table, and yet...

Half an hour later he got a fist to a face for pinching someone’s ass who he’d _thought_ was Gladio, got manhandled out of a little underground bar — he’d thought only Libertus could lift him — and was puking guts and blood with Gladio holding his hair up.

Gladio had been laughing the whole evening, had had this glint in his eyes he’d only seen when talking about Iris; this glint of wonder and thought, cherish and endearment. With his hands on Nyx’s hair, some of the affection seeped through, and somehow a broken nose was worth that.

They never saw the main act, and the next morning Gladio made sure to make fun of Nyx’s nasal voice, but all in all, the night was a success.

When leaving, Gladio left a video open on his laptop. ”This is the band we were supposed to see. I don’t know if you like this kind of music, but this is their best song. I mean, it’s my favourite, at least.”

Nyx found himself eager to learn more.

 

 

_xiii._

A faithful Saturday morning, Iris stomped into the kitchen with a book in her hands. It was his book, one he’d forgotten in the car months ago, now dog-eared and stained beyond recognition. It wasn’t one of his favourites, so he didn’t sweat it too much.

“Gladdy?” She made her way to the stool next to him. “Have you ever been in love?”

‘ _No_ ’ was the first answer. ‘ _Fuck no_ ’ the second. ‘ _Who cares?_ ’ the most prominent one, but only for a second before rounding up to the real one.

“I don’t know,” he said. Because he didn’t.

Iris made a sound in the back of her throat, nodded once, and set down to eat her breakfast.

He couldn’t finish his when the ‘ _yes_ ’ hit him.

 

 

_xiv._

Looking Nyx in the eye never made his stomach flutter or breath catch. He was never caught staring, never felt a yearning to touch the other when they were in public, never had daydreams of having him or nightmares of losing him, but still Iris’ question burned him.

Did he love Nyx? He wasn’t sure. Did Nyx love him? He’d never said anything.

Maybe he was thinking too much of it, had let his adolescence sister rile him up.

So instead of bringing it up, he made sure to hit Nyx extra hard the next time they were training. Nyx took it as a declaration of war and warped them across the yard to throw him off balance, leaving the two of them tangled on the ground with only fists and laughter as their weapons and shields.

Physical he could do. Feelings? Not so much.

 

 

_xv._

Other people handled their feelings more maturely than he did.

He’d known Prompto for two weeks when he confessed.

Maybe Prompto wasn’t a good example.

“So,” he gruffed, staring down the boy. He was a skinny mess, had a bouncy step and fear in his eyes, and was _nothing_ Gladio would ever consider his type, “why me?”

Noctis laughed from another room. “You look like the lead actor from _Accordian Housewives_. He’s had a crush on the guy since forever.”

Unimpressed, Gladio followed how Prompto went red all over. “Not true!” he tried to guarantee. “You’re way cuter than him!”

Turned out he was the third person Prompto had confessed to in a span of a week; the yearly high school dance was closing in and Prompto still didn’t have a partner.

While he laughed it off, Gladio was a little envious of Prompto’s balls to wear his heart to his sleeve like that. Weirded out, yeah, but envious nonetheless.

 

 

_xvi._

Nyx accompanied him to Iris’ 14th birthday party. His father wondered, but not aloud. Never aloud.

The official story went that Nyx was free that weekend, that he had nothing to do and nowhere to go, and that’s why Gladio asked him to come. “There’ll be sweets,” he’d teased, even after Nyx had already succumbed.

But the truth? Gladio wanted Nyx to meet his family.

The whole ordeal went well: Nyx ended up adoring the younger Amicitia, Gladio got off with half the work. The kids were scared of the two buff guys sitting in a corner, laughing in tandem with phones in their hands, but it was cool. They enjoyed themselves while keeping the kids out of trouble; Nyx even got his share of the food, as promised.

Once it was time to leave, Gladio found himself shadowing his friend to the front entrance.

“Thanks for stopping by.”

“Nah, it’s cool. Your sister is lovely.”

There was a fleeting, barely noticeable urge to bend forward, catch Nyx’s lips on his, hug him goodbye, maybe even walk him home. It was there for a second, then gone in a flash, but it managed to leave him cold all over.

“Yeah, she seemed to like you.”

“Who wouldn’t?” the bastard smiled, done tying his laces. “I’m very likable.”

“Debatable,” he laughed.

They stood in the entrance hall for a good few minutes -- Gladio staring the floor, Nyx staring _at him_ \-- before Nyx finally heaved out a sigh.

“Thanks for inviting me.”

“No prob,” Gladio said and turned around. “Now get lost, I’ve got cleaning up to do.”

 

 

_xvii._

It was easy to act as if nothing had changed. No one on the outside had to know of the crossroads he’d led himself to, no one needed to know of the conflict that was brewing in his chest.

Shouldering Nyx’s endearments was hard, but it bought him time to think. There was an edge of hurt whenever he made an excuse to get out of training with him, a look of confusion when he lied his way out of a meeting after hours. For a week or two he ignored his messages and calls, only to find them stop altogether, but instead of a feeling of accomplishment, he found dread wallowing in his stomach.

So _maybe_ he enjoyed spending time with Nyx, just _maybe_ he appreciated and looked forward to hearing him joke about stupid shit and talk about nothing at all. So _maybe_ he had had a few stray thoughts of the future with Nyx in them by his side, and just _maybe_ he wanted to kiss the man a little more often than he now did. Just _maybe_ he had feelings for him.

But was that enough? Was it enough to ask another to stand back from the game, to ask him to settle down? What if this was just something he’d over thought and had come to a wrong conclusion, what if he was to change his mind in the future, what if it wasn’t what Nyx would’ve wanted him to think of, what if Nyx didn’t love him back, what if…

Dwelling on it helped no one, much less himself, so he set himself to find Ulric as soon as possible.

 

 

_xviii._

“What do you mean they’ve been sent away!?”

The anger and panic that had made their acidic way through his body when Nyx hadn’t answered his phone were now boiling their way up his throat. He’d found Nyx’s apartment empty, the barracks like a ghost town, their usual bar none the better, and was now making his way through Ignis’ confidential military reports.

“I’m afraid Captain Drautos sent them to the front lines to ensure a safe return of an intel they’ve been after for months now,” Ignis mused over his book and turned a page. “Not that you’re supposed to know, since, you know, confidentiality and all.”

“When are they coming back?”

“They were expected to return a few days ago, actually. But considering their location, it’s no wonder the connections were lost only hours after they reached their destination.”

The bile, no matter how toxic tasting, turned cold and froze solid. “Where are they?”

“Page 18,” Ignis instructed, lost in his own book. “Enemy territory, somewhere near Gralea. All three platoons were sent, but they’re expecting only a handful back.”

“That’s…”

“A suicide mission in many cases, yes. The captain was aware of the possibility of casualties, though the intel they’re to obtain will… Are you alright?”

Unbeknownst to him, he’d turned paler and paler the longer Ignis kept talking. He didn't manage a word out before rushing to the bathroom to throw up his breakfast.

 

 

_xix._

Gladio knew what loss did to men.

Brave men of proud families turned into empty shells of their former selves, their eyes glassy and hands shaky, voices holding no longer the passion for living it once did. He’d seen it in his comrades, in his friends and his father, and had become to resent it; both the people who fell into a trap of caring and the people who made them fall for them and then left them behind.

When their mother died, Iris was but a babe, so she couldn’t remember what their father had been before. She hadn’t seen his smile shine or hadn't felt his warm embrace, had lived her life without hearing a word of real care from him. Gladio begrudged his father for not giving her the loving upbringing she needed to grow into a whole, loving and lovable person, but couldn’t hate him for once caring with his whole soul and heart in spite of losing it all when things went wrong.

Gladio was ten when he decided he’d never get attached. He didn’t have a toy he hugged when the nightmares came over, didn’t have a favourite piece of clothing or a best friend. Things he enjoyed were bearable at best, things he hated tolerable at worst, for both love and hate were extremes of the same scale and to experience them you would need to _feel_ , so he didn’t.

He knew where he stood in the world, knew what he wanted to keep around and what he didn't need and that was enough, no matter how sad his father’s eyes sometimes looked at him, no matter how he wished to go back in time to change the past. It was his choice, a choice he’d grown to live by, and it was his choice to lately get rid of it, to let love in, to let Nyx in, to let himself feel for all the years he hadn’t.

So when the thought of inevitable loss finally settled in, Gladio found himself loathing both himself for caring and Nyx for letting him care. Therefore he stopped caring, stopped calling Nyx’s dead phone, stopped expecting to see any of the Glaives in the dark alleys in the poor district, and let the shell he’d once shed fall back into place, for only the strong survived, and not feeling made Gladio feel in power.

In a month he fell back to his old ways, and once again was his sister worried of the scowl on his face.

 

 

_xx._

“So, Prom,” he said, and let his hand worm its way on the small of Prompto’s back, “you ever kissed a guy before?”

Despite the alcohol in him, Prompto managed to get embarrassed and flashed bright red. “I -- No? Yes! J-just… Once, though!” he spluttered, eyes clearly searching for Noct. To save him? No, most likely to check that he wasn’t near to hear them. “I… I didn’t know them, y’kno! Does it make me a bad person? They were pretty, though.”

Prompto still wasn’t his type; still too scrawny, too jittery, too submissive. Their interests didn’t match, they had nothing to talk about, he _wasn’t someone else_ … But for all Prompto knew, Gladio could put tonight on being drunk, for wanting to taste someone lips on his after so long.

“You wanna try again?” he asked, smile all teeth and voice brash.

And Prompto laughed, because for what Noctis cloaked beneath a scowl and Ignis with dry sarcasm, Prompto was always laughed on. “Sure? I’m no good, though. Who’s eyeing me?” Though first unsure, he now searched the room with awakened excite in his gaze, looked for someone looking at him, but found no one’s interest.

Before answering, Gladio pressed a lingering kiss on his temple. “That’d be me, then,” he teased, both for obliviousness and eagerness.

The taste of a beer was soon washed away by Prompto’s sweet cherry drink on his lips, and for a second or two it was alright to let go.

 

 

_xxi._

In the dead of night, he woke up to a text message.

_“Come outside_ ,” it said, plain and simple. No answers to previous questions sent a few weeks prior, no hugs and kisses like usual. For all he knew, it could be anyone, since ghosts didn’t have cell reception, but an unsaved number had been burned to Gladio’s mind since day one.

So Gladio went, hastily retreating from the warmth of his bed, and found a dead man standing on his family’s porch.

“Hey,” Nyx greeted him, damping a cigarette next to half-dozen more. For how long he’d already stood there, only the gods knew. “I’m back.”

_I can see that_ , he wanted to say, _Are you okay?_ he wanted to ask, _Where were you?_ and _What now?_ burning on his tongue, but Gladio found himself silently scowling at the ground. “I thought you quit.”

“Ah,” Nyx laughed, _laughed_ at him, and kicked ground on top of the butts, “kind of picked it up in… You know. Kept hands from shaking there.”

“Yeah.” Voice raw, heart rawer, he refrained from reaching over to touch, to make sure he’d come back in the flesh and not some hallucinatory projection. “Iggy told me you were in Ghorovas, all twenty-six of you. Never expected you to come back.”

“You or him?”

“Neither.”

To mask his barely shaking hands, Nyx poked around his pockets and lit another cigarette. “I’m sorry.”

For what Nyx was apologizing, Gladio didn’t know and tried his hardest not to care. It had been two months since they’d seen each other, a month of which he’d dedicated to not giving a single fuck if Nyx was even alive. A first month _he_ should be apologizing for, but the apology stayed stuck in his throat. “When’d you come back?”

“An hour ago.” Nyx grimaced at how easily his apology had been deflected. “Ran by the captain and came here.”

For a live man, Nyx seemed hollow. Both his eyes and cheeks were sunken, fingers’ grip on the cigarette was too tight to be comfortable. He seemed spent and broken, like he hadn’t slept for days, had lost the glint that used to be familiar in his eyes. His whole, sorry existence made Gladio’s insides churn, but the worst spike in his gut came from a realization that he’d come here instead of going to sleep like he should’ve. “Huh.”

Nyx looked up and saw the sorry in his eyes, saw the downturn of whatever he was going to be asked for, saw hesitation and hurt and whatever a face as unreadable as Gladio’s could convey. But still, he asked: “Can I come in?”

“No,” came an answer, as expected. What Nyx hadn’t expected was the follow-up. “Prompto’s sleeping.”

Gladio didn’t elaborate, didn’t correct the initial thought progress that seemed to go through Nyx’s head as his brow furrowed and the smoke seeping through his lips wavered just enough to be noticeable. There was no question on his face, but a cold, hard understanding of something that Gladio wasn’t yet ready to deny.

“Alright,” Nyx said, tasting the decline.

  
“Yeah.”

Something toxic flashed in Nyx’s eyes, a hurtful comment or a deceitful nab, but he smothered it quickly. “Alright,” he says again, with more finality. “Guess I’ll go, then.”

“... Yeah.”

He’d seen Nyx’s back retreat tens of times, maybe closer to hundreds, but not once had it hurt like this time did. Gladio had thought he’d gotten over him, but clearly the beating in his chest disagreed with him.

 

 

_xxii._

Upon walking inside, he was met with an angry blonde in a borrowed shirt and an angry scowl.

“You,” Prompto said and hit his face with a decorative pillow, “are a dense motherfucker! What the fuck, Gladio!?”

“What?” He growled, “you angry at me, too? Get in the line.”

“Well, yeah!” Prompto yelled before seemingly remembering it was well past anyone’s reasonable bedtime and lowering his voice. “Go after him, you buffoon!”

It wasn’t what he’d expected to hear, and the confusion must’ve been visible, for Prompto burst out laughing. “What… What about you?”

“I’m gonna go back to sleep,” he laughed and threw Gladio his last night’s attire he’d brought downstairs. “Sleep in your fluffy bed and dream of electric sheep, that’s what. Now get clothed, he’s probably blocks away by now.”

So Gladio pulled his clothes on, kissed Prompto on the cheek and left.

 

 

_xxiii._

So maybe he’d been ten when he decided loving another wasn’t for him, and maybe he’d lived by his promise for thirteen long years. But sometimes things decided in haste weren’t principles worth clinging to, but instead relics from a broken past yet to be overcome.

That’s why he ran down the streets he’d been raised by, ran and ran as fast as he could, ran without stopping to check for incoming traffic. The streetlights illuminated his path until he reached the poorer districts and the lights stopped, but by then he knew each of his steps like he’d lived there forever, had learned of all the potholes and dead ends to avoid them, of which alleyway to go to cut the trip in half. This wasn’t the part of the town he’d been raised by, but it was the part of the city he’d grown to love like home, and he knew its streets like the backs of his hands.

Gladio beat Nyx by a few minutes, met the man by his own apartment door like he hadn’t turned him down just ten minutes prior. They stood there, their only light a nearby shop’s neon sign, stood there and looked each other in the eyes, stood there and sized each other up. Gladio’s were glistening, not only for the spurt he’d done to get there, but Nyx’s stayed frozen and unmoving, glassed and impenetrable.

“I’m,” Gladio breathed out, “so _fucking_ sorry.”

Because he was. Not just for tonight, but also for meeting Nyx in a place no fit for good people like him, for giving him a false name when not trusting him with his real one, for not coming up with rotten nicknames when they laid shoulder to shoulder on a bed, for not giving him the time and consideration he would’ve needed in the past --

“-- and for not talking to you like a real human being and for turning you away, for not living up to your expectations or mine, for cutting you off just to get mad when you’d done the same, for not being straight with you about how I feel and just how fucking important you are to me.” He took a breath in, swiped a lone tear from his cheek. “I don’t need your forgiveness but I need you to know how sorry I am for fucking this up as badly as I did.”

The words, finally off his chest, fell heavy into the night, echoed through empty streets and bounced off cracked walls. He’d let them nest in his chest for over a year, had grown to loathe them for he wasn’t supposed to care, but by keeping them to himself he’d never learned what it felt like to let them loose and _mean_ them.

Rolling down his cheeks were the tears he’d kept to himself since childhood, for he hadn’t found a person worth shedding them for before now. And now, by his own immaturity, by his own coping, own words and actions, he was to lose a person he’d grown to hold so close to his heart, and nothing made him more afraid than the --

“Gladio.”

Lost in his own self-wallowing, Gladio hadn’t noticed the small but gradual smile appearing on Nyx’s face. It didn’t reach his eyes, not by a long shot, but it was there when he reached a hand to pull Gladio into a hug.

“It’s too fucking early for crying,” he laughed when Gladio hid his tear-streaked face to his neck. “We can talk about it in the morning, okay?”

 

 

_xxiv._

Nyx missed the next morning and only woke up once he’d gotten his twenty-five hours of lost sleep back. He still looked like a sleep deprivation with feet, but Gladio made him eat before another nap took place. For two days they were holed in Nyx’s apartment, other than Gladio running for groceries and getting his phone from home. It was filled with dumb messages from Prompto, a few worried ones from Iris, and a message from Ignis saying the Kingsglaive were back with minimal casualties.

He’d just came back from a run for the groceries when someone knocked on Nyx’s door. Carefully he pried it open and came face-to-face with an awfully familiar woman whose scowl never failed to make him feel small.

“Oh,” Crowe said, balancing a package on her hip, “he did crawl back to you, after all.”

Gladio let her in, let her in to see the unmade place on the bed next to Nyx’s sleeping body, let her in to see his half-made dinner in the kitchen. To her inquiring eyebrow, he shrugged. “Not sure who did the crawling, to be honest. Mostly me, I think.”

“Wouldn’t be so sure.” She laid the package on the table, on top of an empty sandwich plate and paper wrappings from who knew what. “He was pretty sure you hated him, you know. Was sure you wanted nothing to do with him.”

With a grimace, he sat down. “Needed time to think, is all.”

“You ignored him for a month, Amicitia. He thought he’d die before --”

There was a rustle of clothes from the bed, and Nyx’s hand shot from beneath the blankets to try the place next to him. Finding it empty and cold, his head too shot from beneath the warmers, only to be pulled back when his sleepy eyes found Crowe looming over him.

“Who let _you_ in?” he asked, voice muffled.

“Ever so chipper,” Crowe laughed and petted the lump of blankets she thought was most likely Nyx’s head. “I’ll be going then, just came to make sure you’re still alive and kicking.”

“You going already?” Gladio chimed in when she opened the door.

“We’ve been stuck in snow and frozen lush for a month, I think he needs a break from my dashing personality.” A warm smirk was aimed at the bed, and her scorn voice turned tender and warm. “Your weapons are on the table, if you’re interested. Made the boys fix them just for you, you know.”

The blanket shifted. “Thanks,” Nyx said, finally crawling his way from beneath the comforters. “Now get lost.”

“Aye-aye, captain,” she mock-saluted and disappeared before further conflict could arise.

They sat in silence. Nyx rubbed his weary face, tried to untangle his hair with fingers alone, let Gladio study his movements for a good while before meeting his eyes and raising his hands toward him.

“C’mere,” he garbled, hugging Gladio’s torso close to his once he’d walked over. “Missed you.”

“You, too.” Gladio pressed a kiss in the crown of his head and pushed him down again. “You’re tired, I can see it. Take another nap, okay?”

Nyx grumbled but let their bodies settle against the mattress. “Will you be here when I wake up?”

“Yeah,” Gladio said, and had never been as sure about anything.

 

 

_xxv._

“I don’t know why you took me back,” Gladio mused. His eyes followed the top of Iris’ head as the wild bush of dark hair disappeared and reappeared from the midsts of the clothing racks. “You could do so much better, get a guy who’d treat you like you deserve to be treated, live a happy life with him and not worry about my sorry ass, yet you accept _me_ back.”

For her fifteenth birthday they’d promised to take her shopping in a newly opened shopping mall, and for all the dread the thought had brought up in Gladio, Nyx had been one to reassure they’d be alright. He was now elbows deep in some ruffled summer dresses, for she trusted him better with her clothes than she did Gladio.

“I guess.” He smiled a smile of no worries, backed away from the rack with the pink and purple ones, and looped a hand around Gladio’s back to press a peck on his cheekbone. “But one can’t really decide who they fall for, can they?”

For all the times they’d implied _it_ , it never made Gladio not turn red and splutter. “I… Guess not.”

“Nyx! I found a really pretty one!” came a yell from a few rack isles to their left, and Nyx freed Gladio of his one-handed hug.

“C’mon, dear, we’ve got a lady to tend to.”

Following in his steps, Gladio wasn’t sure how he’d ever turned out this lucky. “Motherfucker,” he laughed quietly and sped up to plant his fingers among Nyx’s.

**Author's Note:**

> im here to ship nyx ulric with anything that moves bc i have no self-control. also, i mightve projected ~~a little~~ a lot on gladio's character in this, but hey, it's fanfiction, babeh. also also, let it be said, i finished this at 2:40am on a night between sunday and monday so let's just hope it's up to anyone's criteria ajskdhjkasd  
>  been sitting on this work for a month now, might be working on a companion piece from nyx's perspective? might not? might? might not? who knows! (not me, obvs)
> 
> // edit: oh btw !!! gladio never slept with prom. they're the kind of friends that platonically suck face, alright.
> 
> follow me on tumblr [@notcis-lucis-caelum](http://notcis-lucis-caelum.tumblr.com) for reblogged ffxv content, for i have no idea how to create anything.


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